The Pulpit Commentary — Genesis — Section 167

knai'1'en; so named either from its tremulous, wivea. The words have an archaic simplicity etridulous sound (Gesenius), or from its bent, which bespeak a high antiquity (vide Haver- nrched form (Furst). And the organ. 'Ugabh, nick's 'In trod.,' p. 105), naturally fall into from a root signifying to breathe or blow that peculiar form of parallelism which i.~ (Gesenius), or to mo.ke a lovely sound (FurAt); a well-known characteristic of Hebrew po- hence generally o. wind instrument-tibia, etry, ancl on this account, as well as from fistula, syrin:.c; the shepherd's reed or bag- the subject, have been aptly denominated pipe (Keil); the pipe or flute (Onkelos); the The SO'fl/J of the 811XY!'d (Ewald, p. 267). oi·garum, i. e. an instrument composed of many pipos (Jerome). Kalisch discovers e. Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice; fitness in the invention of musical instni- Ye wives of Lamech, hearken unto my speech: ments by tho brother of o. nomadic herds- For I have slain a man to my wonnding (for man, ns it is "in the happy leisure of this my wound), occupation that music is generally first ex- And a young man to my hurt (because of ercised and appreciated." Murphy sees an my strife). indication of the easy circumstances of the II (for) Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, lino of Cain ; Candlish, " an instance of the Truly (and) Lamech seventy and sevenfold. high cultivation which a people may often possess who are altogether irreligious and Origen wrote two whole books of his com- ungodly ; " Bonar, 11 token of their deepening mentary 011 Genesis on this song, and at de\lravity-" it is to shut God out that these last pronounced it inexplicable. The chief Ca1nites devise the harp and the organ." difficulty in its exegesis concerns the senB'.l Ver. 22. -And Zillah, she also bare Tubal- in which the words •l'IJ"l;J r: - T •:::i• are to be taken. cain. Worker in brass or iron ; related to 1. If the verb be rendered as a preterite Persian, t?J,pal, iron dross (Gesenius, Rodigcr, (LXX., Vulgate, Syriac, Kalisch, Murphy, Delitzsch). Keil and Furst think this Persian Alford, Jamieson, Lother), then Lnmech is root cannot be regarded as the proper explan- represented as informing his wives that in ation of the name. Furst suggests that the self-defence he has slain a young man who tribe may he.ve been originally named Tubal, wounded him (not two men, as some read), and known as inventors of smith-work and but that there is no reason to apprehend agricultural implements, and that Cain may danger on that accon.n t ; for if God had have b~e11 afterwards added to them to iden- promised to avenge Cain sevenfold, should tify them as Cai1litcs (vide 'Lex. sub 110m. '). any one kill him, he, being not a wilful The name Tubal, like the previous names murderer, but at worst a culpable homicide, Jabal and Jubal, is connected with the root would be avenged seventy and sevenfold. vabal, to flow, and probably was indicative 2. If the verb be regarded as a fnture (Aben of the general prosperity of the race. Their Ezra, Calvin, Kiel, Speaker's. "The pre- ancestor was specially distinguished as an terite stands for the fnture . . . (4) In instructor (literally, a whetter) of every protestations and assurances in which the n.rti.11.oer (instrument, LXX., Vulgate, Kalisch) mind of the speaker views the action as in brass (more correctly copper) and iron. already accomplished, being as good as ~pi:!, according to Gesenius a q1111drilateral done"-Gesenius, 'Heh. Gram.,' § 126), then the father of Tubal-ca.in is depicteJ. from the eh. 11¥, to transfix, with', o.ppended; o.s exulting in the weapons which his son's according to Flirst out of ~HI, from '1f, to be genius had invented, and with boastful arro- hard, by resolving the dagesh into r. And gance threatening death to the first man the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah-the that should injure him, impiously 11.'lserting lovely. Considering the genoral significance that by means of these same weapons he of names, we shall sce.rcely go astray if with would exact upon his adversary n vengeance Kalisch we find in the name of the sister of ten times greater than that which had been 'fubal-cain, "the beautiful," ns compared threatened against the murJ.erer of Cain. with that of Ade.m's wife, "the living," o. Considering the character of the speaker and growing symptom of the tlegencracy of the the spirit of the times, it is probable that times. Beauty, rather than helpfolucss, this is the correct interpretation. 3. A thirtl. was now become the chief attraction in interpretation proposes to understand the woman. Men selected wives for their lovely words of Lamech hypothetico.lly, as thus:- forms and faces rather than for their lovin"' " If I should slay II man, then," &c. (LU11ge, and pious hearts. The reason for the intro~ Bush) ; but this does not materially J.iffer ducbon of Naamah's nnme into the narrative from the first, ouly putting the case con- commentators generally are at e. loss to dis- ditionally, which the first asserts categori- cover. Inglis with much ingenuity connects cally. 4. A fourth gives to •:;, the force of a it with the tragedy which some see in the question (vide Stanley Leathes, 'Heb. Gram.,' lin~s thnt follow. p._ 20~), nnd imagines Lamech to be rtssuring Vars. 23, 2.S. -And L11mech so.id unto his bis wives, who nre supposed to havo been  TRE BOOK OF GENESIS. [CR. IV. 17-26.